Cop pleads guilty in gambling raid case

A former Suffolk police officer pleaded guilty Wednesday to a charge of obstruction of law enforcement for warning a friend about raids on illegal gambling parlors in the county.

Calling his actions, "bad judgment on my part," now retired Emergency Service Officer Robert Dito, 58, said in federal court in Central Islip: "I was at my job. . . . I became aware there was going to be a search. . . . I was calling him as a friend to prevent him from being arrested. . . . I should have thought about that harder than I did."

Before his statement, U.S. Magistrate Arlene Lindsay asked Dito, of Manorville, a 29-year veteran of the police force, how he pleaded, and he replied in a barely audible voice, "guilty."

Dito was among more than 100 people arrested in January by what the U.S. Justice Department billed as the largest-ever takedown of organized members and associates.

Charges against most of the others arrested along the East Coast are still pending in the sweep by FBI agents, detectives from the Suffolk County district attorney's office, and other law enforcement agencies, according to officials.

Dito's attorney, Thomas Spreer, of Babylon, has said that his client's calls were made in March and September of 2009, to a friend who owned a repair shop in Ronkonkoma that fixed his family's cars. Spreer said his client was unaware that the friend was involved in illegal activity, other than gambling.

Assistant Suffolk District Attorney Spiros Moustakas, who has been designated a federal prosecutor for the case, declined to comment.

Dito, who could theoretically could face up to five years in prison, is more likely to face 12 to 18 months as part of a plea bargain. No date has been set for sentencing.